


Sunflowers and Starry Nights

by DumbTeenBoy



Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types, Les Misérables - Victor Hugo
Genre: Angst, Author loves Vincent van gogh, Enjolras Has Feelings, Hurt No Comfort, I Wrote This While Listening to Hozier's Music, M/M, Vincent Van Gogh Feelings, grantaire has feelings too, they’re sad feelings
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-22
Updated: 2020-05-22
Packaged: 2021-03-03 04:08:35
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,352
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24318598
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DumbTeenBoy/pseuds/DumbTeenBoy
Summary: After a mission gone wrong, Grantaire introduces Enjolras to Vincent Van Gogh
Relationships: Enjolras/Grantaire (Les Misérables)
Comments: 6
Kudos: 18





	Sunflowers and Starry Nights

“Distract me.”

Enjolras’ voice cut abruptly through the intercom, startling him out of his panicked silence. His mind was racing and he could feel his heart beat in his ears, pounding like a hammer on an anvil.

“What?”

“R, you’re the only thing connecting me to the rest of humanity and” he faltered for a moment “and we both know this is the last conversation I’m ever going to have… I don’t want to think about that too hard. I’m begging you just talk about anything.”

Enj’s voice was always smooth, even when he got so angry his face flushed red and the veins in his neck stuck out just slightly, his voice was always smooth and articulated. But here, floating and untethered in space his voice had a frantic, almost hysterical air around it.

With the back of his hand, Grantaire roughly wiped the tears from his face and racked his brain, pushing away the immense self-loathing weighing on his mind like a stack of bricks.

_ It should be you out there. It’s your fault, you caused this and now Enjolras is going to- _

“Van Gogh” He blurts, anything to keep his mind busy.

“Huh?”

“Uh, Vincent Van Gogh. Real famous painter, lived nearly 300 years ago, I’m sure I’ve mentioned him before”

“I can’t say I recall, you should keep talking, to uh, to jog my memory you know?”

A shrill beep sounded behind Grantaire and his blood ran cold.

He turned around in a manner that faintly reminded him of old horror movies he enjoyed, to the blinking red light beside a screen displaying a dangerously low bar. 

The words  **Tank 4 [see: Suit Three] Oxygen Levels Low: 30 minutes until supplies are exhausted** were just sitting there in bold lettering as if those fourteen words weren’t causing Grantaire’s whole world to come crashing down around him.

He held back a sob and turned back to the comms.

“Well uh he was born 30th of May- no wait um March, yeah March, Amsterdam in like, 1853?” R cursed himself for not paying more attention to that stupid documentary. He hadn’t put it on to learn anything really, his whole art thing was just a hobby, he never expected to actually need the information.

“Don’t worry about the dates R-”

“Don’t...Don’t talk” Grantaire frantically threw a glance over his shoulder. The timer had dropped two minutes. “I know you’re the unshushable, but you don’t have the O2 levels to not be shushed”

Enj chuckled, though it sounded tense and quiet

“Okay” he whispered.

_ He’s going to die _

Grantaire shook his head, denying the inevitable. Here was the cynic, finally having hope when his fearless leader needed it least.

“So this Van Gogh dude, right? He was super talented, genius with a paintbrush-”

“Sounds like someone I know.”

“Enj please-”

“I know but I… I want to talk to you. I’ve spent my whole life speaking up despite what people tell me, it just… it seems wrong to stop now”

“You’re an idiot… I love you so much but you’re an  _ idiot _ enj” 

His angry tone was ruined by the sobs beginning to spill over and shake his entire body. The love confession wasn't intentional, but he'd be damned if he let Enjolras go without at least letting him know.

“I love you too R, I wish we told each other this in better circumstances but I can’t go without telling you.”

Grantaire was dizzy, he wanted to throw up. Enjolras loved him. Enjolras  _ loved _ him… He had imagined a hundred different ways Enj could confess his love for Grantaire over the 5 years of partnership at the station they worked at.

This was never how he would have imagined it. 

This wasn’t how the mission was supposed to go. It was a simple satellite fix but Grantaire had been an idiot and ended up putting both their lives in danger. But of course, the hero in Enj shone through, leading him to (literally) cut ties with Grantaire.

He took a deep shaky breath.

“You know that print I have back in my office at home? That was one of his, the Poppy flowers in a vase. It’s one of my favourites.”

“I’ve always loved looking at that print”

There it was again. Love. Enj loved Grantaire and he loved the Van Gogh print on his desk.

And he’ll never see either of them again.

“R? You there?”

“It isn’t fair… it’s not fair Enjolras!” He was painfully aware how he sounded like a whining child but he couldn’t care less at this point. 

“I need you- you can’t leave me, you don’t deserve this- no one does. You need to get to a board meeting tomorrow at six and you have lunch with Courfeyrac and me on Saturday to just talk and eat crappy bagels. And I know you hate those bagels-and board meetings- but you deserve to be there- to be alive and live your life-” 

Grantaire had forgotten his original point, the pain in his chest was so strong, that for a moment he thought he was suffering a heart attack. 

“Hey, hey R it's okay. It’ll be okay love, don’t worry about me yeah? You’re going to go home and you’re going to live your life. Because that’s what  _ you _ deserve. You’re going to see the Poppies in real life one day and drink champagne in Amsterdam and you’re going to get to go to awful board meetings and have crappy bagels. Because you deserve your life.”

This was ridiculous, Enjolras was the one in danger yet here he was comforting Grantaire.

“The Sunflowers.”

“What about sunflowers?”

“No no  _ the _ Sunflowers… a famous Van Gogh painting- one of his best- he had loads of sunflower paintings, the dude was obsessed with them but this painting made it big after he died...Reminds me of you actually.”

“I wish I could have seen it.”

“Well, maybe you could.”

“Grantaire-”

“Look I know I can’t… I can’t get you back. But you’re not too far to broadcast the images to you… I brought a book with me. Give me a second.”

He looked at the countdown and his stomach dropped. Five minutes 

Grantaire looked around for his bag and scrambled to get the book out, grateful to his past self for thinking he’d be bored on the short trip, packing “Top 50 artworks of all time” there was a whole two pages dedicated to Vincent van gogh.

He flipped to the pages, covered in rich yellows and blues. He scanned each painting and zoned in on Enjolras' location and thanked the gods above for the advanced technology of 2219.

There was a pause as they sent through.

2 minutes

Enj gasped slightly.

1 minute 40 seconds 

  
“They’re beautiful…”

“Yeah, yeah they are”

“I’ve seen this one” Enjolras broke the pause

“Which one?” Grantaire laid the book open in his lap.

“I think it’s, Starry night? Is that the name?”

50 seconds

“I love that one” R said quietly tears dropping on the paper under him with the painting burning into his mind.

“I think- my favourite-”

“Enj- Enj you’re going out of range.”

20 seconds

As if some higher being took pity on the young boys, the comms cleared for a moment and Enjolras’ voice cut through.

“Grantaire, if I’m sunflowers, I’d like to think you’d be starry night-”

The comm beeped.

The silence that followed was almost deafening.

“E?” Grantaire whispered into the silence.

“E please, please don’t leave me.”

He turned around to the monitor.

**Oxygen levels extremely low: 0.50 second(s) until supplies are exhausted**

**Tank 4 [see: suit 3] Oxygen levels: Exhausted.**

He’s gone.

Grantaire stared down at the Starry Night painting in his lap until his eyes burned,

The swirls flooded his mind and swam in his vision.

And now he was alone, simply a paint stroke within the night blending with the rest of the world. 

The only sounds within the spacecraft were screams of anguish, blue pulsed from the ship, swirling with the brightness of the cold stars surrounding him.

  
  


**Author's Note:**

> Sorry for the pain I may have caused hhfuddu.
> 
> So basically, in case it wasn’t clear, this is set in the future, where enj and grantaire work at a space station.


End file.
